Abstract

As many as (50%) blind people in Indonesia have average dental and oral hygiene level 2,3 including medium category. Poor oral hygiene in blind people is caused by 3 things, namely cariogenic food, tooth shape and lack of knowledge about oral and dental health in blind people due to lack of education on how to maintain oral hygiene. This study aims to determine the relationship of oral hygiene with brushing teeth skills in children with visual impairment. This type of research is an analytical survey with cross sectional design. Research respondents amounted to 16 children with visual impairment sampling technique is purposive sampling whereas data collection techniques conducted in this study using dental hygiene examination sheet and observation sheet to know the skills of brushing teeth. Data analysis in this research use Spearman's test of correlation with hypothesis test based on significant level α <0,05 with 95% confidence level. Based on the results of this study indicate there is oral hygiene relationship with the skill of brushing teeth, this is indicated by correlation value = 0,703, p = 0,002. It can be concluded that the hypothesis that there is an oral hygiene relationship with brushing skills in the blind child is acceptable because basically the intelligence ability of the blind child is the same as the normal child but if the skill ability of brushing the teeth of the blind child is less then it will affect oral hygiene.

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